Malone got his first hit song through hip-hop cosplay, but he never had much interest in rapping or becoming a rapper. Almost as soon as he made his swagger into monoculture, the Austin Post-born artist began to pursue a path closer to his heart, driving his Bentley through genre-agnostic pop circles and, like, Like any scene artist worth his salt, hopping lanes and getting into the zeitgeist.
Now, after releasing several albums full of breezy pop-rock odes to self-medication and self-loathing, Post Malone is going country.
It’s not a completely surprising move: His albums have increasingly flirted with country music and tropes, with the spur-stomp of “Go Flex”, the gentle strumming of “Lemon Tree” and a couple of country hooks ‘s Orchard Metaphor – Cousin’s hit song from last year’s “Austin”.
The inevitability of Malone’s move to country music was further heightened last year when he appeared on a remix of emerging banjo-stomping player Noah Kahan’s “Dial Drunk.” Like pop culture leader Drake, Malone jumped on the bandwagon and said he was in the driver’s seat. Soon Malone was working with country superstars Luke Combs, who had just covered one of the best songs of all time, and Morgan Wallen. Warren is a wannabe outlaw with a strained accent and a heavy drinking habit. He then offers the latest example of blandness everywhere by drawling vowels on Beyoncé’s brand-friendly “Levii’s Jeans,” a collaboration that’s a head-scratcher even for Nile Rodgers. And The-Dream can’t be saved either.
Malone was a shrewd navigator who knew his stuff. He named country revivalists Sturgill Simpson, Tyler Childers and Colter Wall on Joe Rogan’s podcast, and his selection of country cover songs has been impeccable over the years—Simpson’s “You Can Have the Crown,” Toby Keith’s “You Can Have the Crown,” “As Good As I Ever Was,” Brad Paisley’s “I’m Gonna Miss Her” — even if he didn’t. When he plays and sings country music, Malone’s vibrato is heavy but his emphasis is light.
Malone kicked off his country music coming-out party at the CMAs last November, performing a cover of Joe Diffie’s “Pickup Man” with Warren and Hardy. Malone outshone the bro-country star and hip rocker and was met with critical acclaim—unsurprisingly, he didn’t receive the same backlash as Beyoncé’s “Cowboy Carter.” But the real star of the show is a bona fide country rapper, Jelly Roll, a 39-year-old who sings country gospel from the heart and has real rap bona fide: When Malone was on hand, he The Southern rap syrup is being poured.
On the road to making a country album, Malone helped launch a new album for Swift, who had made the crossover from country to the highest heights of pop music a few years earlier. Although he did the opposite, he might have been successful, especially if he’d surrounded himself with the best collaborators, songwriters, and session players Nashville had to offer. But inevitably, Malone’s country dalliance may fade away like one of the countless Wei Light beers that have sustained his career: good taste, but no flavour.
